RCEC honors NPs during first Nat’l Clinic Week

By Antoinette Alexander

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. —This year’s third annual Retail Clinician Education Congress, which was held at the whimsically themed Swan and Dolphin Resort located at the doorstep of Walt Disney’s Epcot, was especially “magical” as it attracted nearly 500 nurse practitioners and was held during the first official National Convenient Care Clinic Week.

“The reality is that we need accessible and affordable options for primary healthcare services, and all of you provide that and are part of a larger healthcare system,” Tine Hansen-Turton, executive director of the Convenient Care Association, told attendees.

Retail Clinician magazine, in conjunction with the Convenient Care Association, hosted the event Aug. 2 to 4. It convened in line with the start of National Convenient Care Clinic Week, which became official when Sens. Dan Inouye, D-Hawaii, and Thad Cochran, D-Miss., introduced Senate resolution 585.

Kicking off the conference, Lt. Col. Corina Barrow of the Army Nurse Corps and currently the Nurse Corps Detailee for Inouye, welcomed attendees and read from the resolution presented on the Senate floor by Inouye on July 22: “Mr. President, today I rise to recognize all of the providers who work in retail-based convenient care clinics and the resolution to designate Aug. 2 to Aug. 8, 2010, as National Convenient Care Clinic Week. National Convenient Care Clinic Week will provide a national platform from which to promote the pivotal services offered by the more than 1,100 retail-based convenient care clinics in the United States. Today, thousands of nurse practitioners, physician assistants and physicians provide care in convenient care clinics at a time when Americans are more and more challenged by the inaccessibility and high cost of health care.”

The three-day event included a panel discussion on the “Past, Present and Future of Convenient Care”—comprised of panelists Ken Berndt, director of Bellin FastCare; Web Golinkin, president and CEO of RediClinic; Sandy Ryan, chief nurse practitioner officer of Take Care Health Systems; Andrew Sussman, president of MinuteClinic; and Cynthia Graff, president and CEO of Lindora—as well as a keynote presentation on “The Future of Nursing” by Susan Hassmiller, senior adviser for nursing and director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative on the Future of Nursing at the Institute of Medicine.

Nurse practitioners also participated in more than 14 live hours of continuing education, with topics ranging from the management of diabetes to identifying pediatric emergencies to respiratory conditions and treatments. The conference also featured an exhibit hall area where 25 different supplier companies demonstrated products for attendees.

In addition, the Retail Clinician/CCA CARE awards (see story) honored nurse practitioners, clinic leadership and those outside of the industry whose support has helped advance the model.